


The Tower and the Hovel

by Jedi Amoira (Darcerenity)



Series: DAO Fic Fragments [6]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, F/M, Humor
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2010-03-05
Updated: 2010-03-05
Packaged: 2018-03-10 13:42:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3292442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darcerenity/pseuds/Jedi%20Amoira
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alistair and Elan light the signal beacon only to find disaster ensues. Alistair tries to cope with this turn of events while Elan lies unconscious.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Dark Tower

Even as the kindling began to blaze, Elan and Alistair were moving to the nearest vantage.

The night was dark in spite of the various flaming projectiles in the process of being exchanged, and the bottom of the valley was so distant...it seemed little more than a dark, roiling mass...a sea of death and sin. Elan shuddered slightly.

Woofus bumped against her leg, offering comfort.

Elan squinted, trying to make out the flicker of movement that would confirm Loghain's troops had seen the beacon. "I can't really see what's happening," she said fretfully.

Woofus gave a soft, plaintive whine.

"Okay," Elan said grimly "Now I'm _convinced_ something's gone wrong—Woofus can't see the reinforcements coming either."

"They have to be coming," Alistair said, though he didn't sound convinced. "Loghain is—well, he's _Loghain_ , Elan. He knows what he's doing."

They waited for what seemed like an eternity.

"Alistair..." Elan said anxiously. "Where are they? They're not coming..."

"Oh, Maker..." Alistair breathed, "not another one."

In spite of the poor visibility, the looming shape of the ogre was nearly impossible to miss. Elan could see—or imagined she could—the vibrations running through dark mass far below as it lumbered closer. It stooped and straightened, more quickly than it seemed something so large ought to be able to manage, a sudden, bright flash in its hand. Then, slowly, the brightness resolved itself into the shape of a man.

"Alistair," Elan pleaded heavily, "please tell me that isn't—"

Alistair swore, darkly and inventively. Woofus yipped agreement.

Even as they watched, the ogre flung the bright object away. It arched and sparkled across the valley like a shooting star .

"There," Alistair said, sounding tense, "that white flash...is that Duncan?"

"Is he...climbing that Ogre?" Elan's question was his answer.

"Duncan..." Alistair moaned in a sort of plea.

The faint chink of Alistair's armor had Elan moving after him, but a bolt of pain shot through her shoulder, making her falter.

Alistair's dark eyes widened in alarm. He swung his heavy wooden shield to intercept several more arrows even as Elan jerked to the side, dodging one and more-or-less-accidentally deflecting another with her blade.

Several darkspawn rushed toward them, shouting.

Alistair raised his sword and shield, tensing as if he meant to leap in front of her.

Something slammed into her ribs, knocking her off her feet. She wasn't sure if the several smaller thuds were just aftershocks, or actual hits. Her head slammed into the floor, making her see stars. She struggled to regain her feet, but her limbs felt so...heavy and limp.

She wanted to shout at Alistair and Woofus, tell them to get free while they had time...tell them Duncan and the king were far more important than a girl already living on borrowed time—but her lips didn't seem to want to move. She could feel her breath ebbing, carrying her awareness with it...there was nothing she could now. She had already done all she could...and it wasn't enough. It wasn't nearly enough. _Father, forgive me..._

Duncan's instructions to protect the raw recruits had been meant to apply to their time in the Wilds, and no further, Alistair knew. He had managed that much...but, somehow, he felt the recruit at his feet was still under his protection. Why else had Duncan sent her with him to complete a task that no one had expected to require the presence of a single Grey Warden, let alone two of them?

And now he didn't even know if she was alive...he couldn't spare time or movement to check... _One task, Alistair_ , he berated himself, _Duncan and the king give you one stupid, little, trivial task. A task so small you feel slighted And, in the end, you go and fail. You're failing the King. You're failing her. And you're failing Duncan. Twice over._

Alistair hacked indiscriminately at the crowd of darkspawn. The dog circled the girl on the floor, growling and snapping at anything that ventured too close.

Even if he and the dog managed to drive back this unending horde, even if his charge could be revived...how would he ever accomplish those things in time to aid Duncan and the king? But the very thought of leaving Elan behind—however temporarily—made his stomach writhe with guilt, and wasn't it already too late, anyway? It had been too late by the time they caught sight of their leaders on the field, too late from the instant they realized Loghain hadn't come...But what, oh what, if it wasn't?

The question was nonsensical. Alistair wasn't going to be able to hold out indefinitely, and the surge of darkspawn into the Tower showed no signs of ending. Already he could feel himself tiring, though whether exertion or desperation weighed more heavily upon him would have been hard to determine. Maker, please, I'll count my death a victory, my life well-lived, if only you'll let me save them—

He fell back, yelping in pain as his leg snapped. The dog's snaps and growls seemed to have changed, expanding into a huge, bellowing roar that surged through Alistair like the taint in his blood, making his vision flicker.

Or maybe that was just the darkspawn swarming over him, their swords and their daggers, their jagged teeth and their ragged nails tearing at his flesh...

Then the dragon loomed over them and into his vision and he knew he and Elan and the dog were lost, knew it too conclusively for fear or even for regret.

The dragon cracked its tail like a whip, knocking darkspawn in every direction. Alistair felt a huge, clawed talon close firmly around him, lifting him off the floor...Suddenly, he was soaring through darkness, speeding toward toward death...


	2. This Cold Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alistair finds he isn't as dead as he expected. But...

Light returned as a warmth against his face, a flicker against his eyelids. He realized he didn't feel weightless any more, but was instead pressed quite solidly into something slightly soft overlying something quite firm...a pile of skins on a hard-packed dirt floor. "Somehow," he said, "death isn't quite what I imagined."

"And on what basis do you make such a ridiculous proclamation?" a voice asked, hovering between scornful and amused.

Alistair frowned. It was damned familiar somehow, that voice and that tone...

"Come now," the voice continued crisply, "surely you aren't disappointed to be among the living?"

"Disappointed?" Alistair repeated, remembering the flare of golden armor arching over a battlefield, the white flash of Duncan's mad rush, the red puddle of Elan's blood seeping around him...the dark shadow of the dragon. "It's not like I could have survived the darkspawn, let alone the arch—" he said, arguing with the voice, pointing out that it must be mistaken. He wasn't among the living.

"Yes, well, I suppose you have a point," the voice said grudgingly. "You wouldn't have survived if mother hadn't swooped in when she did."

"Swooping is bad," Alistair muttered thickly. His frown deepened. The words, too, seemed familiar. "Uh, wait. What?"

"The darkspawn," the voice said impatiently. "They overran your position. You very nearly died, but mother decided to intervene for some reason—goodness only knows why—you certainly don't seem worth the trouble to me. I would have rescued your king—he'd have been worth more in ransom."

"What do you mean you _would_ have rescued the king?" Alistair gasped, lurching upward, making the world spin about him.

He found himself staring into eyes like gold seen through smoke, eyes set in a delicate oval face framed with a dark, silky fringe of hair. "Hey! You're the one that had our treaties! You're that sneaky witch-thief."

"I had nothing," the girl snapped. "I took nothing. 'twas my mother. Or did the darkspawn steal what few wits you had to call your own? Witless or not, one would think you'd have manners enough to thank those who tend to your wounds!"

Alistair glanced down and realized with a shock that he was wearing nothing more than his small clothes. His leg had been splinted between two stout branches of wood, and for what he was feeling, he would never have known there was anything wrong with it. A nasty gash along one of his ribs was covered with a compress, and so was a rather large lump on one of his temples.

He blushed from the tips of his ears to the tips of his toes, and hastily yanked the furs tucked around his waist up to his neck. "Yes, fine, okay. Thanks."

"Oh, you really needn't bother." the witch-thief snapped, tossing his tunic into his lap.

A series of puckers and welts marked a trail of inexpertly mended rips and tears across it—lingering traces of contact with darkspawn weapons and his own chainmail. The tunic had been washed, but the back and most of one side bore a rusty discoloration that made Alistair's heart twist.

"If you didn't want me to thank you, then why did you bother complaining about it? Or were you just trying to distract me from my questions about the king?" Alistair pulled the tunic over his head, wishing the witch-thief would return his pants while she was at it.

But he wouldn't be able to get them on without help even if she did—not with his leg in a splint—and he'd rather not have help, especially if she was the one he'd have to ask to get it. Even if he did ask, his pants weren't likely to fit over the splint. He could cut the pant leg off so it ended where the splint began, but he knew he'd regret that when the splint came off. He sighed gustily and tucked the furs back around his waist—more tightly than necessary.

The witch smirked at him, but her voice was short with frustration. "Your king and his men were massacred. Mother said there was nothing she could do. The man who was supposed to respond to your signal quit the field. "

"The king was what!" Alistair gasped again, feeling as if he'd been hit in the chest with a particularly nasty mace...which, come to think of it, he had been...several times.

"Killed." The girl said slowly and distinctly, as if she thought him too stupid to comprehend. "The king was killed. As was most of his army."

"Dead," he whispered. The word seemed to echo loudly in the tiny room. "The king is dead. What about...what about...did you—" He broke off at her scowl. " Okay, okay, did _your mother_ see a tall, dark man...in a silver breastplate? And white robes...or robes that used to be white, anyway?"

The girl shrugged. "You best ask mother about that. But I suspect he does not yet live...especially if he was on the field near the king."

_Failed. I couldn't even manage to die with Duncan—the only friend I'll ever have. I couldn't even manage to die for my king. I failed them. I failed him._

Alistair didn't know how long he sat in silence before the idea slowly dawned on him. "If the battle was lost...if the darkspawn won...then...they haven't been defeated?"

"That is the general meaning of the word 'won' is it not?" the girl reminded him, thrusting a cup into his hands. "Drink that. Mother says it's to help accelerate the healing."

Alistair downed the contents of the cup. It tasted very much like a sort of warm, flowery tea. It seemed completely and utterly at odds with the conversation. What he needed was some whiskey. The strongest whiskey ever made. "Then the Blight...must still be coming. The...the other Grey Wardens?"

"The Grey Warden Recruit who was here with you before" the witch-thief replied, clarifying, "the one capable of holding a coherent conversation? She is...not well, in truth. But she is here. And she yet lives..." The witch-thief sighed. "Must I really reiterate that the other Wardens do not?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Morrigan and Alistair's dialogue is modeling from some dialogue lines in the game, but I have tried to keep that to a minimum.
> 
> I seriously considered entitling this fic "Stranded Somewhere with No Pants" because of this chapter. In case you wanted to know.


	3. Go in with Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Alistair undergoes a vigil (of a sort) after all.

"All dead?" Alistair repeated hollowly, staring into the empty cup. "All of them dead? _All_ of the Grey Wardens in Ferelden are dead?"

The girl snatched the cup away. "All except the one who accompanied you to the Tower, yes."

"Elan," Alistair said. "Elan."

The witch-thief shot him an odd look. "You mean the girl?"

"She...was...just one of the boys," Alistair said, and his eyes began to burn. "She...was down before I could...I thought she... She's really alive?"

"Did I not say so? She is gravely injured, but—"

"Where is she?"

The witch-thief rolled her eyes. "Behind you. Don't expect much in the way of conversation." She stalked out of the room. Out of the...hut...really...as it seemed to be only the one room.

Alistair inched along the floor until he could see a smooth cheek—though it seemed far paler than he thought it should be—framed by loose strands of hair visible only where they sparked copper in the lowlight, and a small, square hand.

He reached and stroked a finger along the length of the hand, testing to see if it was real. It felt real...

He woke up again sometime later.

He'd been sleeping, her hand clutched in his, pressed to his heart. He blushed to the tips of his ears, grateful the only witness to his odd behavior was unconscious...but, then, why wasn't she conscious?

"Elan?"

The form on the floor remained quiet and still. Too still. Too quiet.

"Elan, listen...I know...it's my fault you're hurt...but...just...please forgive me...I need you to wake up...I need you to get well...everyone else is dead...everyone...and the darkspawn are out there...and I've only been a Grey Warden for six months. I know, I know, that's six months more than you, but, really, I might as well have joined yesterday..." he made a sound between a cough and a chuckle. It sounded disturbingly like a dying man's gasp. " _And I don't know what to do._ Even if I did, I just...I really don't want to do it alone...if I even could...which I doubt...please...please...don't make me do this alone."

Alistair sat in the room for what seemed like hours. Holding Elan's hand. Willing her to be all right. Drifting off into sleep. Occasionally the witch-thief would appear and brew more of the strange tea. He drank it without complaint. If she or her mother poisoned him now, it would be a waste of the time and effort they'd spent to save him, and it didn't matter much to him if they did.

Just how much time had passed was hard to gauge in the unchanging, murky light that seemed to fill the hut, but Alistair guessed it was two or three days before the witch-thief removed the splint from his leg and got around to returning his pants. He knew he ought to ask how long he'd been unconscious, how much time had passed since...but speaking the words aloud would have made the battle seem so much more...over. Final. _Like the end._ The very thought made him shudder. It made him want to weep.

The witches must have sensed his mood, though he would never have expected them to understand it. Whatever their reasons, they left him mostly to himself—well, to himself and his fellow Grey Warden, anyhow—returning to the hut only to prepare meals and tea, or to sleep, and, once in a while—far less often than he thought necessary, and far more often than he was happy to see—to hover over Elan: lifting the blankets and furs, consulting in whispers, exchanging bandages, and muttering as if casting spells he could only hope were doing more good than not.

Sometime around the time he finally regained his pants, he thought the color was beginning to seep back into Elan's face...but he couldn't be sure, and she didn't wake.

A day or two after that, she began to mutter in her sleep. Alistair was torn between relief and frantic worry—especially when he heard his name. It seemed good she might slowly be returning to the land of the living...but what if she was merely slipping further into delirium?

He peppered the witch-thief with so many questions he thought she might strangle him with the bandage she'd just removed from a part of Elan's anatomy he tried not to imagine, lest it make him blush...or lest Elan wake, see his thoughts in his face, and do her best to make him regret them...though, on the whole, he almost wished she would.

When the witch-thief folded the bandage and set it aside, he was surprised, and a part of him that longed to suffer for his failures—or to make others suffer for them in kind—was more than a little disappointed, although she did so with pointed deliberation. "Mother says you should take a short walk to be sure all is well with your leg," she said.

"Later." He said a bit shortly, trying to angle his body to get a better view of Elan's face. He wished he could tell if she was even breathing.

"Mother doesn't really take kindly to people who don't follow instructions," the witch-thief said with exaggerated patience. "Just a short walk. I'll stay with your friend."

The last thing he wanted was to walk away from his fellow Grey Warden...but if the witch-thief's mother had really rescued them from that tower, she had to be formidable...and the last thing he needed or wanted was to make her mad. Alistair reluctantly began pulling on his armor, grateful to see it had been cleaned, if inexpertly. "If there's any change...if she..."

"Oh, just go!"

Alistair stumbled out the door.


	4. Ready to Be Wardens: One Life, One Price, One Duty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Elan recovers to wonder why Flemeth rescued two green Grey Wardens from certain death while Alistair concocts a plan that may or may not be mostly his own idea--previously posted as a separate 2-chapter sequel to The Tower and the Hovel entitled Ready to be Wardens.

It was quiet. It was too damn quiet.

The voice murmuring through her had been nothing like the taint in her blood—the taint maddened, it burned, it screamed of fear and it stank of despair—this voice...well...the despair was there...and yet, the despair was different...it was warm, imploring...affectionate? It drew her and comforted her...she struggled up toward it...up through the darkness and the pain...but as she drew closer, it vanished.

Elan woke with a start, nearly cracking the woman leaning over her in the nose with her head. Any other time she might have been apologetic, but she had bigger worries at the moment. "Where am I? What happened to the darkspawn?" _Oh, curse the darkspawn, as if I cared! What happened to Alistair? And where's Woofus?_

"We are in the Wilds," the woman said, sounding reasonably calm and friendly under the circumstances. "I am Morrigan, lest you have forgotten, and I am bandaging your wounds. You are welcome."

Normally Elan would have blushed at the remonstrance, but nothing about this situation felt normal in the least. She stared at the woman in disbelief. "I remember you...but..."

"How does your memory fare, then? Do you remember mother's rescue?"

"I remember being overwhelmed by darkspawn," Elan said, clinging to this fact, the only certain thing in a ridiculously uncertain world.

The dark-haired girl nodded.

"Loghain...didn't come." Elan said, slumping back into the pile of furs and blankets. "The field...was overrun...we were overrun..."

The girl nodded again, looking pleased, presumably with Elan's ability to recall as much, rather than with the circumstance. "Just so."

"Then...everyone died? The king? Duncan? The other Wardens?" Elan thought she might be sick. She wished she were hallucinating, but somehow she doubted it.

The girl nodded a third time. _Maybe I am hallucinating at that; why else would that nod resound through my head like a death knell?_ Elan shook her head a bit wildly, desperate to clear it.

"Your friend," the girl—Morrigan?—said a trifle disapprovingly, "he is not taking it well."

"How do you take something like this well?" Elan demanded, her voice veering dangerously close to frantic. "This is horrible!" Then her heart gave an odd sideways lurch. "Wait...did you say my friend? You mean Alistair?"

The girl looked relieved, as if this question heralded some return to reason. "The suspicious dim-witted one who was here with you before, yes. He is outside with Mother. She wished to see you when you awoke."

Elan looked down at herself in her small clothes and up at Morrigan.

Morrigan smiled slightly and walked over to a small chest near the wall. "Here are your things."

"I'll go then." Elan struggled upright and began to dress.

Her armor felt like a burden she thought she had finally set down, only to pick up again...and heavier than before...but the burden...well, maybe it didn't feel entirely unwelcome. She was still alive. She still had a chance to do her father's bidding, a chance to pay her debt to Duncan as a Grey Warden. A chance to make Arl Howe and Teyrn Loghain pay.

Elan took a deep breath, musing over the lingering tightness beneath the dressings where a couple of arrows had pierced her lung. She straightened her shoulders and pulled the door to the little hut open.

"Thank you, Morrigan...for taking care of me." she added, feeling awkward and inadequate.

"I..." the witch seemed surprised, "I am no where near as skilled as mother...but..." she smiled shyly, "you are...welcome."

Elan took a few steps away from the hut, the door squeaking shut in her wake.

Alistair was standing among the tall reeds a few feet away, his profile limned on the rosy sunset like the image on a coin. Elan paused in mid-step, her breath catching in her chest.

"You see," Morrigan's mother said without turning around. "Here is your fellow Grey Warden. You worry too much, young man."

Alistair turned toward her, disbelief and wonder warring in his face. "You...you're alive!"

Elan stared back, drowning in relief. Hers and his.

"I thought you were dead for sure," Alistair said.

So did I. "I'm fine," she said, sounding considerably more nonchalant than she felt. "I appreciate your concern," she added, including the woman who was watching them in the comment with a glance.

"This...doesn't seem real," Alistair sighed, staring at her as if he was afraid she might vanish if he blinked. "We should be dead on top of that Tower. If it weren't for Morrigan's mother—"

Elan barely heard the witch's remonstrance, nor the exchange that followed, though some part of her did register a certain realization that under other circumstances, she might have found the whole exchange rather humorous. As it was, however, she could only wonder...

"So why _did_ you save us?" Elan asked warily, remembering the price Duncan had placed on her life.

"Well, we cannot have all the Grey Wardens dying at once, can we?" The witch retorted, almost flippantly. "Someone has to deal with these darkspawn. It has always been the Grey Wardens' duty to unite the lands against the Blight. Or did that change when I wasn't looking?"

So...the price was to be the same. One life, one price. One duty. Elan supposed that was something. Unfortunately, she'd proven a miserable failure at living up to this duty so far. If she hadn't, she and Alistair would hardly have been in need of rescuing.

Easier to focus on someone else's failings than to admit how much she feared and regretted her own. "The land is hardly united, thanks to Loghain."

"It doesn't make any sense!" Alistair protested. "Why would he do it?"

"Now that is a good question," Flemeth said, her dark eyes assessing him. "Men's hearts hold shadows deeper than any tainted creature. Perhaps he believes the Blight is an army he can outmaneuver. Perhaps he does not see the true evil behind the threat."

"The archdemon," Alistair whispered, his eyes returning to Elan's. The dragon she'd seen in the Joining seemed to hover between them.

"Then we need to find this archdemon," Elan said, her voice thin and faint as a single thread in a tapestry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dialogue for this fic is taken from/modeled after lines in DAO, though I have tried to keep this to a minimum.


	5. Ready to Be Wardens: As We'll Ever Be

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Elan agrees to the impossible, maybe not entirely just to make Alistair smile. Part of the FF.net Ready to Be Wardens.

"By ourselves?" Alistair exclaimed incredulously. "No Warden has ever defeated an archdemon has without an army of thousands at his back..."

_Well, then, at least we'll have surprise on our side,_ , Elan thought, almost amused by the idea.

Alistair seemed to read the thought in her face. "Not to mention," he added, sounding defeated, "I don't know how."

_Then I guess we're off the hook,_ Elan thought with a surge of relief. But she knew it wasn't that easy. They'd been granted a reprieve, a bit of time before the inevitable, not a release from their duty. They would have to face the archdemon eventually...after they figured out how.

"Why would Loghain leave Ferelden undefended like that?" Elan demanded suddenly, the words a bit too close to a wail. "What could he hope to gain?"

Alistair looked at her as if she were being deliberately obtuse. "The throne? He's the queen's father. Still," he said, suddenly looking perplexed, "I can't see how he'll get away with murder."

"You speak as if he would be the first king to gain his throne in that way," Flemeth scoffed. "Grow up, boy!"

Alistair wheeled on her, suddenly fierce. "If Arl Eamon knew what he did, he would never stand for it! The Landsmeet would never stand for it! There would be civil war!"

Arl Eamon, the arl of Redcliffe. Elan had never met the man, but she'd heard her father speak of him, often and with respect. They had fought together in the war against Orlais. With Loghain. With Howe.

"You think the arl would believe us over the teyrn?" she asked cautiously. Good man or not, surely it wouldn't be strange for him to believe his comrades in arms over two ragged survivors of an order whose influence in Fereldan had waned centuries before?

"I...suppose..." Alistair drew the words out as if testing them. "Arl Eamon wasn't at Ostagar; he still has all his men. And he was Cailan's uncle. I know him. He's a good man, respected in the Landsmeet." He turned to her with sudden enthusiasm. "Of course! We could go to Redcliffe and appeal to him for help!"

Elan struggled against the sudden urge to believe too much too soon. "And say he doesn't help us," she said, as a gently as she could. "What then?"

Which, of course, was when Flemeth interjected, reminding them of the treaties...and Alistair's enthusiasm was joined by something else, something that looked disturbingly like hope.

Elan wasn't at all sure she appreciated the way the witch seemed to be encouraging Alistair's apparent expectation that the two of them would be welcomed with open arms, as if they had only to ask in order to receive. It was probably her imagination, but it seemed as if the witch was fully aware he would be disillusioned, and was as pleased by that as by his resolution...like a spider toying with a fly.

"So can we do this?" Alistair turned to Elan, his hope deepening, steadying, burning bright. "Go to Redcliffe and these other places and...build an army?"

Elan sighed. Even if it hadn't been her duty, she simply wouldn't have been able to deny the man anything when he looked at her like that. She wasn't entirely sure she appreciated that particular vulnerability...and, yet, she did...because simply seeing him so happy made her own heart lift.

"I doubt it will be that easy," she warned him. Warned herself. Even though she knew at least one of them wasn't listening.

Flemeth laughed. "And when is it ever?"

"It's always been the Grey Wardens' duty to stand against a Blight," Alistair reiterated.

Elan knew he was right, but, she realized, he was also parroting Flemeth's earlier words. She frowned.

Alistair didn't seem to notice. He stepped closer, his forehead nearly touching hers, as he lowered his chin to stare intently into her eyes. "And right now, we're the Grey Wardens," he reminded her, sounding resolute, reaching out to touch her gloved hand with his. Her treacherous heart melted.

"So you are set then?" Flemeth asked. "Ready to be Grey Wardens?"

It was hard to concentrate with Alistair standing so close, but Elan thought the witch didn't sound surprised, nor particularly pleased. She also seemed neither skeptical nor believing. Elan wished she had a better idea of the witch's priorities and plans.

"As ready as we'll ever be," Elan said, almost surprised to find the resolution in her tone a match to Alistair's. The slow, steady smile that crossed his face made her blood heat; she smiled wryly. That certainly made it harder to feel the cold fear climbing its way up her spine. "Though I'd settle for staying alive," she added dryly.

"Hmmm," Alistair said, sounding surprised. "Now that you mention, that would be nice." His fingers squeezed hers, just a bit. Then he suddenly realized what he was doing, and hastily dropped her hand, stumbling awkwardly away.

Flemeth laughed again. "Well, you can't expect me to do everything," she said flippantly. For some odd reason, the words made Elan relax. Slightly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dialogue for this fic is taken from/modeled after lines in DAO, though I have tried to keep this to a minimum.

**Author's Note:**

> Titles for this fic are vaguely based on Scene IV of Shakespeare's King Lear.
> 
> Dialogue is modeled from game dialogues.


End file.
